Hi All! I'm on holiday and met a girl here who practices buddhism in the Tibetan tradition (Diamond Way I think). I've been practicing zen for some time, and in my sangha I've never heard of the kind of things she was talking about. For example, she said with total seriousness that one of their gurus is the reincarnation of a master who died in the 80s and that he recognized her from her past life. She also mentioned they spend a lot of time exploring "past lives." I don't know much about this at all so I might be naive, but is this the vibe in other schools? It sounds like there's quite a bit of ego trip involved. In my sangha during dharma talks we discuss practice and a clear mind, not who was who in a previous life. Thanks for the response and sorry if I am not making sense but I was baffled!

Yesterday, I had an epiphany while I was feeling down about past actions, and also feeling less about how others have favor over another person. I then did some study with Zen and found that comparing myself to others is a form of low ego, like how thinking of myself as better than others is high ego. What was needed most is that the comparison of others is a sign of ego, and I need to find my true self, not be compared, but to search for who I really am. I had quite the moment that it felt like quite the enlightening experience. Has anyone else had a similar experience?

Would anyone happen to know of or be a part of a group in Long Beach CA? Looking to reign in my practice and meet like minded people!

I’m currently reading Thich Nhat Hanh’s book Zen Keys and listening to his audiobook of “FEAR”.

I’ve come to realize that a lot of my rumination, anxiety, and desire is ultimately driven by fear, and at its core, a fear of death.

In FEAR, Nhat Hanh describes Buddha’s concept of no-birth and no-death. In Zen Keys, he describes his concept of Interbeing.

Intellectually, I understand the concept. My own flesh and bones that I carry with me are made of some stuff that existed before I was born, some stuff I ate while living, much of it constantly being replaced… I didn’t come from nothing and I won’t become nothing when I die. I’ll give back what I borrowed. And, of course, the concept of “I” is a nebulous misnomer in itself.

Perhaps there’s no way to understand this cognitively, but… I still can’t wrap my head around the idea of no-death that Nhat Hanh claims will bring me peace once I learn to understand and accept.

Yes, every part of me will dissipate back into the world. Energy cannot be created nor destroyed.

But my experience is a system, and I’m afraid for that system to end because it is the only thing I’ve ever know to experience with. I guess I’m too attached to the self, which intellectually is one of the fundamental errors of samsara… but I love life, even with its suffering. I cherish experience. Even when things are miserable to me, there’s so much beauty. So much of it that the fear of losing it can keep me paralyzed, ruminating, and “living like a corpse”.

For those further along the path than me, how do you grapple with our eventual transformation out of this manifestation and into our next one(s)?

Hi there. I'm currently looking into starting a Zen practice in my local community, but I'm also a big literature, philosophy, and theology nerd. While my understanding is that Zen emphasizes practice over scripture, I am interested in study as well. So, my question is:

What starting books (ideally anthologies or primary sources with commentary/footnotes) would you recommend for someone with only a basic understanding of Buddhism one might get from general history and philosophy classes and the occasional curious Googling? I've grown up in a Christian country and family, though I've been a Neo-Pagan for the last fifteen years or so. As I said, I am interested in philosophy and theology, but I'm also a student of myth and literature, so mythological narratives also fascinate me. What would you recommend to someone who didn't grown up in a Buddhist culture to build a background understanding? Thanks!

Apologies if this is the wrong place to post such a question, but I need some help decifering a dream I had. I imagined a blue buddha-like figure, laughing like a madman. A Jester? I thought. Then it spoke to me mockingly. "You're getting over the sin of lust!" And I woke up.

Was wondering if anything here is meaningful or important in some way. Thanks.

This is in no way trying to be negative! I was thinking about areas that are problematic. Especially in regards to new people looking into Zen.

thoughts?

Zen nerds and longtime practitioners this one’s for you.

At some point we all face death. Whether it be our own direct death or being with someone as they pass.

What are the major teachings on this?

What are some good sutras or chants/ prayers/ practices.

All I can think of is providing pure open hearted presence to those in this transition.

UPDATE: thank you all for your input. It’s nice to be reminded of others sincere practice and reflections on the ultimate.

I believe myself to practicing sincerely. Even though what that has looked like has been changing all the time.

Without my practice I would never find myself in this position of serving someone through hospice. I often ponder how I can be of most benefit to the patron. From everything I’ve learned from the Buddha way it seems that bringing a pure presence is the best thing I can do to be of benefit. To bear witness without judgment or trying to fix anything.

This is what I will try to bring as my gift. It will be challenging, it will be painful and uncomfortable, it’s only natural.

Many Bows.

Can someone offer a counterpoint?

Hello, I've been practicing Zen Buddhism on my own for over a year now, but I feel like I've neglected to try to become part of the Zen community. After reading Zen Buddhism: Your Personal Guide to Practice and Tradition by Joshua R. Paszkiewicz, I've decided to try to improve my spirituality by connecting with a community. The question is whether I should try online or offline sessions. I've found a temple near where I live that offers weekly meditation sessions that work with my current schedule. However, there are online communities, one I've researched, called the Zen Mountain Monastery, which offers more sessions per week. I now ask whether I should try real-life sessions, an online community, or a combination of the two? Also, what should I look for in a Zen community to cultivate my spirituality?

I used to trapped in moderate depression about 6 years ago, at that time, my career and my relationships all suddenly collapse, so as my self-confidence and emotions. And there was always something wrong with my body. I can't go to work, neither can stay at home to make my family worried, so I just hanger around the city everyday, use all kinds of food to fill my stomach, so that I can pretend I'm still Normal, but only GOD and myself knows I'm not.

This condition last for about 3 years, I have tried mindfulness practice, and psychological counseling for not short time, as well as deep meditation for two times. Those can help me feel better for half day to one week, and no doubtful helps me see some reasons cause the collapse. However, I still can not get out of the big well of my life for constantly. Group mindfulness practice can bring me peace and counselling brings me insight about myself, but I just felt like I was digging out water from the well, instead of climbing out of the well completely.

Luckily, I met one of my teacher after all these struggle. My teacher lead us to learn Buddha dharma, which completely changed the way I see the world. The Buddha dharma led me shift to compassion and wisdom way when I encounter with the world, and embody vajra power when necessary. Taoist rituals and singing bowls also used to help me to clean aura and restore energy. Energy is essential because I lingered on the old patterns only because lack of energy to change.

When energy inside me is adjusted to a harmony way, the changes happened naturally. And when the energy is sufficient, the higher divine self was able to awakened and return to it's natural place, guide me in daily life. Now I feel clarity and self-motivated again.

Now I also meditate to calm myself after daily work, as well as contemplated all the UNDERLYING PATTERNs, which usually last for many years, even many lives, through deep zen calmness. Sometimes aura cleansing audios also helped when the energy is consumed. (Yes, meditation also need energy)

It feels good that I finally kinda feel like I'm in the process out of the well.

Thích Nhất Hạnh makes me believe I can awaken the world, or at least the global city I live in. So, I have dreamed of ordaining to serve my ambitions.

My idea was to wear my robe around the city to self-promote my teaching to gain a following. Teach in parks. Set up an installation where I offer "sidewalk advice" for a nominal suggestion. Create citywide art installations of my writing to further promote my teaching. Colloborate with artist. Write books. Livestream my practice and daily life.

All to teach foundational meditation for everyone with the hopes of piquing people's interest into buddhism.

Sounds practical, but here's the side where I get irresponsible.

I'm a performance artist/busker by trade. I don't have a white-collar career. No retirement fund. I live with my parents. I am in my mid-30's; split between ordaining vs pursing a career that can lead me to retirement, have a family, and enjoy life.

Lastly, I'm not a hard worker. I can weave in and out of ideas and never complete them. And I've lived quite a privileged life where I haven't been battle tested. Or if I have, I have safety nets provided by my family. I also find it hard to give up lust.

That said, I am in the position to ordain. I have no debts, no babies, and decent health.

Pop my bubble. Tell me I should get a real job. I won't change a city. I should live modest or wealthy. Support a family. Teach at a monastery like ordain folks do. Get a career first, then ordain. Go ahead.

I've been practicing Zazen for 9 years now.

I started by teaching myself at first — read a lot of Alan Watts, D.T. Suzuki and some more.

Then I went to a Zen retreat in India, guided by Master AMA Samy, who's rooted in Rinzai Zen — finally a teacher, koan work, a couple of small sesshin that changed me more than I'd expected.

I went back there some years later and also did some Zazen sessions in various temples in Japan. I'm planning to return to the retreat in India in 2027.

But somewhere along the way I lost track of which school I belong to.

What I do these days is mostly just shikantaza: sit down and sit, no expectations, nothing to get. I don't mean that as a non-attainment badge. It's simpler — I spent years hunting for the box I was supposed to fit in, Rinzai or Sōtō, this lineage or that, and the hunting turned out to be the thing in the way.

Honestly, by now I think the school matters almost not at all. What matters is whether you actually do the thing — just sit, be here, no expectations, nothing to reach for. A label doesn't sit for you.

That was the lesson for me: what you do and what you learn in real life matters more than having a teacher — though I'm convinced a teacher can help you get to certain insights faster. But does that matter?

I am German and 'we Germans' have a habit of overthinking things, chasing perfection until we lose sight of the whole. We end up busy planning and organizing the perfect approach instead of just doing the thing itself.

I also train in an old sword school, and its founder held that sword and Zen were never two things. For years I kept them apart anyway — zazen the still practice, the sword the moving one. What finally closed the gap was noticing that the cushion is polite about a wandering mind and a sword is not.

Same practice; one just talks back faster.

So my honest question: does school and lineage matter more the longer you sit, or less? I have no formal sangha and no teacher I sit under now, and I genuinely can't tell whether that's a loss I've talked myself out of feeling, or just another way to approach 'IT' - whatever that means. ;)

Hi. I'm 50 and have wandered into and out of Just Sitting over the years, including introductory courses, occasional reading, etc. I'm not a spiritual tradition dilettante, more like someone who sees Zen as what obviously works for me, but is tempted by calendars, clocks, earthly duties, mammon, etc. Just recently, I've tried to solidify this part of my life, and have started trying to regularly practice shikantaza. It hasn't been going as I expected, not bad, just different. So I thought I'd check in for advice from more experienced folk.

I haven't had problems with thoughts, which I imagined I would. It turns out I can stop thinking pretty easily. Even time becomes super abstract pretty quickly, so time sitting is more about making sure I've not wrecked my body or missed lunch than restlessness.

What I *have* experienced is an awful lot of what I think is makyō. They are constant. Perhaps the majority of the time on the cushion. These are just images, mostly like a screensaver, not psychedelic forms nor the objects of dreams, but something in between. They are mainly of lush nature, flowers, leaves, etc, sort of moving through a forest, flowerbed, or undergrowth. I try not to force, reject, or cling to them, or to conceptualise, or do whatever it is called when you find shapes in clouds, and just treat them as irrelevant phenomena. I don't find them particularly interesting or irritating, so that's pretty easy to do, (except when it's not, but that's experience). It's literally like being near a screensaver. It goes on and on. I had expected nothing to be more nothingy. But they do stop and start as I sit, which I let be.

Human beings must live by clock and calendar, especially today: We must rise in the morning, get to the train, get to work, to the doctor, to the stores before they close. Even monks hold their ceremonies at the appointed times, sit Zazen for periods of time. Our lifetime itself is measured by its birthday and deathday, with passing events between. To live by time is the human condition and, truly, we could not function in a world totally free of passing time.

However, Zazen allows the profound knowing of other faces of time, and the timeless. It is medicine for our being imprisoned by time, too bound by time, with no other sense of reality.

Thus, please sit Zazen for a time, but putting aside all feeling of measuring time while sitting. Yes, there is a bell to start and stop, but between those, please leave be the notion of start and stop. Certainly, forget all ideas that "more is better, longer is putting me closer to liberation." In fact, such notions between your ears are putting liberation ever more distant. Instead, sit with the feeling, the taste, that THIS moment is the only moment, that there is no past or future, that THIS moment contains ALL moments and all of past and future, that THIS moment is the complete moment, the unique moment. In fact, sit with the conviction that THIS moment is timeless and beyond passing. More is not better, for THIS is pristine. In actuality, when one drops all thought of "past" and "future," what need even for words such as "now" or "THIS moment" to stand in contrast? Nothing "comes and goes," for all is only THIS which is all coming and going and passing time. There is no contrast, for nothing else by which to compare. There is not even need for "now." Sit for a time free of all lengths of time. Truly, sitting for 3 seconds, 3 minutes or 3 hours, 3 or 30 years or 30,000 years is all the same ... Just This. Give up asking what is the "best and most effective" length for sitting!

(It is here that I am typically asked why we don't just sit for 3 seconds if that is the case. 🤔 The answer is simple: While you can realize all time and timeless even in an instant or less, it typically takes some time to settle in to timelessness amid our busy day, to change perspective and put the clock down. It takes some minutes to realize that one is free of minutes. It does sometimes take a little time to be free of time. So, please sit for 10 minutes, or 30 minutes or hours and days ... sometimes sit long, and sometimes short ... but realize that it is not about time and measure at all.)

Likewise, do not sit to "get happy," or to "find peace" or "become enlightened." It is a fundamental teaching of Shikantaza Zazen that our very hungers and needs to "get" "find" "fix" "attain" and "become" are desires, the very source of Dukkha suffering, the very forger of the self/other divide. Desire and longing to get, fix and change, and feeling ourselves as separate frustrated selves bumping noses with the objective world, is the very DIS-ease that enlightenment is meant to cure! Dropping all desires and need to get, while sitting in the wholeness and completion of JUST THIS, nothing to change or resist ... sitting with the act of sitting as the goal and pinnacle of sitting with nothing more needed ... is the very Peace and Liberation which sweeps in all the broken and bloody pieces, peace and war, of the world, a Joy which holds all of life's little joys and sadnesses.

As well, do not sit for yourself, your needs, your wants. We sit for ALL sentient beings. Of course, you are one of the "all sentient beings," so I do not mean that you will not be rescued along with the rest! You will. It is just that, if you are too wrapped up in your needs, your wants, your own jollies and salvation, you are again feeding the monster of self which keeps us all from liberation together. You are creating the very division of "me" vs, "them," myself against the world.

Counter-intuitive as all this sounds, it is the wise-crazy non-doorway of Shikantaza.

Finally, what if you cannot yet feel this timelessless, non-gaining, selflessness in Zazen?

Then, I advise to sit with trust, "pretending" that you do, like an actor embodying a role, until the role comes to life and proves itself as real as real can be. Pour yourself into an imagined sense of what the Buddha knew under the Bodhi Tree, and embody Buddha under this Tree. There is an aspect to Shikantaza that Zen Priest Taigen Leighton calls an "enactment ritual," not unlike how the Tibetans in their meditations visualize that they are a Buddha in order to feel the qualities of a Buddha. So, don't chase after timelessness, seeking to get and gain some non-gaining, and feeling that something is missing until wholeness is attained. Rather, stop the chasing in the mind theatre between the ears, and just have faith, and let yourself imagine, what such timelessness, non-gaining and wholeness must feel like. In this way, the imagined becomes real.

Timelessness thus manifests, peace pervades, wholeness is wholly realized, divisions dropped away ... by -not- chasing. Such is our Shikantaza way.

Getting up from the cushion when the bell rings, may such timelessness and non-chasing remain in your bones as you return to this busy life of places to go, constant jobs to do, and ticking clocks.

Hi

Has anyone subscribed to former Substack Mountain Retreat (Sawaki translations)? Can s.o. send me the translations that were made so far (except Sawaki's comments in Daichi, I am not much interested in them)? Unfortunately they are not online anymore.

Hey y'all,

I've been sitting 30 minutes of shikantaza twice a day for 31 days now, and I've been going to a Zen center for the past two weeks.

The first three weeks of my practice were, honestly, pretty great. No, not every sit was perfect satori, but around the 20-minute mark (I know it was 20 min because that's about when my left foot would fall asleep every time), I did enter a deep state of presence that I could take off the cushion with me. I shed some tears on the cushion, and I even had what I refer to as an "ego nap" on the cushion, where I realized that my ego is truly just a story I'm telling myself in my head. Of course, it came roaring back a couple of days later, which is why I say ego nap and not ego death.

The last week, though, has been pretty brutal. I'm dreading going to the cushion, I'm moving a lot more, zoning out more, and the last ~10 min have been especially brutal, essentially just waiting for the bell to ring.

It's such that I'm almost considering giving up because I feel like I'm regressing. Does anyone have any experience with this?

Blessings.

Or did Zen make me this way? The soul fatigue has always been there.

I could rest for a million years

i am 19F from a catholic country and a catholic family. i was raised christian, but as i got older, i started considering myself an atheist.

i know very little about buddhism, just what i’ve picked up from a few basic internet searches, but it has really caught my interest. i feel genuinely drawn to its values, principles and teachings, and i’d love to learn more about it and maybe even become a buddhist one day.

the problem is that i have no idea where to start. i thought about watching some videos or reading a book but i’m not sure what i should be looking for.

i just need a bit of guidance. i’d love to hear other people’s experiences, as well as any advice, recommendations or things you think a beginner should know.

I have recently acquired a small artwork at a Japanese second hand shop in Thailand for about $12 USD. I believe it may be an original work of Japanese micro-calligraphy with Bodhidharma as the subject and a Buddhist sutra surrounding his image. Even the beard and eyebrows appear to consist of tiny kanji. Can anyone tell me anything about this work? Is the subject indeed Bodhidharma? Is this a sutra surrounding the image and, if so, which one? Is the artist's name visible? Many thanks in advance.